[DrAwdeOccarim]

I’m surprised by your strong wording. >”… severe side-effects and likely consequences of long-term statin use, even low doses.”

Could you provide a few reputable clinical outcomes studies to support your statements? I was unaware of these risks.

[simianparrot]

For one: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2949584/

These drugs require constant monitoring by physicians that understand what to look for, that are actively involved in adjusting dosage, for them to be even remotely safe. Muscle atrophy is considered an "uncommon side-effect", but that's just because most studies aren't performed over long enough periods of time. People tend to be kept on statins permanently. And that changes the safety factor considerably, as it does with any medicine taken over years.

My anecdotal evidence is based on multiple family members on these drugs and how even in Norway, with our fairly good healthcare system, it's not monitored sufficiently to avoid issues. There's a lot of strong feelings around statins as is apparent in the other response to my comment, but claims about them being safe except in outlier cases is simply not true.

[cthalupa]

The numbers suggested in this article (and to be clear, what you have linked is not a study - it is a discussion by graduate students in a PT/exercise science program. Not to disparage them, but this is not primary research) do not match the results we see in actual RCTs or meta analysis of them.

See the bottom half of my comment at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45446913 - significant muscle damage is exceedingly rare, and ~90% of the muscle pain reported in the RCTs ended up not being related to the statins at all.

Your claims are simply not backed by the data. These are some of the most prescribed and studied drugs on the planet.